Diversity watch
Bookworm on Apr 04 2006 at 9:42 pm | Filed under: Education
Have you ever read Daddy Long Legs
I forgot to mail this yesterday so I will add an indignant postscript. We had a bishop this morning, and what do you think he said?
"The most beneficent promise made us in the Bible is this, 'The poor ye always have with you.' They were put here in order to keep us charitable."
The poor, please observe, being a sort of useful domestic animal. If I hadn't grown into such a perfect lady, I should have gone up after service and told him what I thought.
This passage keeps popping into my mind when I hear people in my community clamor for "diversity" in the schools. Aside from the fact that I think this clamoring is bizarre from people who have chosen to invest heavily in a very white community (few people of color), that's very family oriented (few people of different sexual orientations), I also keep wondering what their goal is. Are they thinking about benefitting the students who are classified as "diverse" (a code word for (i) not-white, (ii) not -straight, or (iii) the-child-of-not-straight) or are these students intended to be teaching tools for the more ordinary kids at the school?
I've harbored this rather unworthy thought for several years, ever since I heard a school administrator rave about a handicapped child who had just graduated from the school. There was no doubt in my mind that the child had benefitted enormously from the wonderful school, and it was equally obvious that his family was deeply grateful for his having had the opportunity to attend the school. What was striking was the administrator's speech. Rather than speaking about the child's having overcome hurdles, or about the skills the child had learned, the entire speech was about how the child made all the other children learn about dealing with the handicapped, and about different educational styles and about (wait . . . here it comes) diversity. In other words, the child was celebrated, not for himself, but for "being a sort of useful domestic animal," intended "to keep us charitable." That's not diversity; that's using people.
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4 Responses to “Diversity watch”
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Horror of horrors!! We have a DIVERSITY disaster in our communities Jr. High School. Oh woe is us. Our students are so shortchanged that they won’t ever be able to satisfactorily merge into our society for you see we have only 13 male teachers out of a total staff of 60. Oh, the humanity! Those unfortunate students are doomed, I say doomed.
As Kant said, treat people as they are, rather than what they can do for you.
The phrasing is forgotten.
Here’s another angle.
A good friend taught third grade in a lovely New Hampshire town for 30 years. She loved her job, but opted for early retirement because she couldn’t take the diversity. What set her off was the unfairness of placing a severely handicapped girl who could in no way benefit from being there, into her classroom and force the other children to cope with a situation most adults couldn’t handle.
This child was at the developmental level of a new born. She couldn’t sit up, turn her head or focus her eyes. She was moved around lying on her back in a kind of large baby carriage. Her movements were those of a baby. Hands and feet moving around seemingly aimlessly, making loud noises. Two aides accompanied here everywhere and tended to her continuously all day. She took up all the space and attention in the room, scaring the other kids and taking their attention away from their lessons.
The only reason for this farce was that her parents insisted that she be treated like any other eight year old. While we can sympathize with the parents and understand their pain, the decision about her placement should lie with those who can do so with less emotional baggage.
The parents of the rest of the kids were brow-beaten not to object, so their kids lost a full year of their childhood education.
Daddy Long Legs — what a wonderful book! I absolutely agree with her indignation towards the Bishop, and I think it unfortunate that his attitude is shared by many good, well-meaning charitable people.
As a high school senior applying for a community service scholarship, I was asked to write an essay on the statement that “Community service is the rent we pay for living in society.” I was very much afraid it would cost me the scholarship, but I could not restrain my distaste at the idea that volunteering was a due to be paid. I felt, and feel, that volunteering is a great way to give something back to your community, interact with people (older, younger, different relgiions, etc.) that you might not meet otherwise, and learn stuff in the process (Habitat taught me building skills, I learned how to groom horses at Joshua’s Farm, heard some great stories from older folks at a soup kitchen, etc.).
Similarly, I was disturbed at a mother saying that she just hoped her grandchildren could be so fortunate as to volunteer and learn the lessons that she had learned. Note that she didn’t hope that the poor unfortunates grew richer, more educated, more self sufficient, healthier, etc — but that this useful domestic creature would be similarly available to her grandchildren.
I realize your comparison was to diversity, but I have read literally the same passage in Daddy Long Legs and compared it to the useful-animal attitude that some volunteers have, so I thought I would add my $0.02.